First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes…sex? At least that’s the case for Hollywood power couple Meagan Good and DeVon Franklin. In an industry that often glorifies premarital sex in everything from chick flicks to thrillers, the actress and the executive movie producer are an anomaly—going against the grain of the typical and reverting back to traditional views of marriage in which the honeymoon comes before the honey.
And if you ask the duo, it was certainly worth the wait. Not just because of the anticipated wedding date, but because of the rewards that came with the risks (or in this case the sacrifices) of not diving into a relationship centered around sexual pleasure as detailed in their latest book The Wait: A Powerful Practice for Finding the Love of Your Life and The Life You Love. 
Flip through the pages of their love story and it’s almost a perfect script of its own. Although the couple have been around each other for years from movie sets to red carpet premieres, it wasn’t until the pair begin filming for Jumping the Broom in 2011 that the two would fatefully cross each other’s paths, which ultimately lead to a 13-month long courtship before the couple finally tied the knot in 2012.
But as magical as their story seems, it wasn’t always a fairytale. There were moments of frustration as the couple tackled every issue in their relationship from baggage from previous relationships to deeper insecurities that are often overlooked when couples rush to get in between the sheets. And of course, there was the whole no-sex until marriage thing that came with its own set of challenges. As DeVon likes to jokingly say, “I mean, it’s Meagan Good!”
Not everyone served as a solid support system either. Meagan’s reputation as a “party girl” dimmed the light of her relationship with the part-time preacher, while DeVon, who was already 10 years deep into practicing celibacy, was met with opposition from peers who didn’t understand his decision of delaying gratification for the sake of spiritual, personal and professional gain. But both the Think Like A Man actress and the former VP at Columbia Pictures (DeVon recently left the company to start his own production company, Franklin Entertainment) credit their strength and perseverance to God, who remains at the center of their relationship and marriage.
With over three years of marriage under the belt, the couple has come together to give insight into the one decision that built the foundation of their matrimony, getting real and diving into the questions and mentalities that make many hesitant in chapters such as “If I Don’t Sleep with Him, I’ll Lose Him” to “The Problem with Sex.”
To shed light on what made Meagan and DeVon’s practice “The Wait” before saying “I do,” we spoke with the couple on how they successfully navigated celibacy while working in Hollywood. Catch the highlights below!
Waiting allows you to get to know "the real" in your partner:
DeVon Franklin: I think so much came out of practicing “The Wait” and having the time to get to know each other and see things clearly, and not allowing sexual attraction to cloud the vision and also cloud our judgment. I think that in dating, your judgment is one of the things that will serve you the best if you do everything to preserve it. And our dating situation, having judgment and being able to see her and her being able to see me gave us both the confirmation and the confidence that we were meant for each other.
Marriage should push you out of your comfort zone and make you better:
DeVon: What I say is that you can’t go into marriage trying to change someone, but marriage will change you. So me, it’s like hey I’m going into marriage I am the essence of who I am and Meagan gives me the freedom to be that, but marriage has totally changed me because every day I’m not only married to the love of my life but [I] also have to consider what are her thoughts? How would she want me to do this? What does she need from me? And how does she need for me to be supportive? And just those considerations change me. I think I’ve gotten more overall in my life more understanding, more compassionate, more patient with people. I’m very different than how I was when I was single.
Meagan Good: DeVon has always been, from my understanding, very career-oriented and focused, and by the book. He’s willing to do the work and go above and beyond, so the way that he approaches life is like that across the board. And for me, while I have a great work ethic, I’m a lot more free-spirited and chill, and so when we came together we were able to give that to each other. He helped me straighten up a lot and get even more focused on my career and how to approach things and not to just do the work, but go above and beyond. As a result, it changed my career; it created different opportunities before me.
You have to get rid of baggage to build a solid foundation:
Meagan: For me personally, I had to allow God to really work on me because I had a lot of damage and baggage coming into it, and things that I had to work on and I had to face those things head on. I’d never really done that before. So that was the biggest transition for me—facing my fears and allowing God to work it out. A lot of the healing that came was in the relationship because a lot of it was about acceptance and being loved for who I was. Even when we got married one of the things that DeVon said was, “I love you for who you are right now, even if you never change a thing about you, I love you exactly how you are.” That was good for me because I’d never experienced that before. It was always some type of conditional feeling that even though I felt like I was enough, that the person didn’t feel like I was enough.
The person who is meant for you will stick in there:
Meagan: In the beginning, I self-sabotaged because there were all of these feelings of unworthiness and not being good enough, a lot of fear, and seeing how far I can push the person before they give up on me. And he stuck in there with me and literally it’s been the best thing because his love, and the love that God gave him for me, was a huge catalyst to a tremendous amount of healing that I’ve needed for such a long time.
It's important to leave room for mistakes in marriage:
DeVon: It was God, for sure. And just having patience and then love. We’re in this together. I’m not going to assume that I know how to be married or that you know how to be married. We need to have room to make mistakes and learn from those mistakes and come into a better understanding of what oneness looks like, so it was like being flexible and give each other room to get adjusted. I think so many times we have this romantic idea that we get to the altar and say yes and everything is going to be great. No, that’s where the work begins. There’s a whole lot that goes into creating an environment of freedom and flexibility and faith in a marriage. So as we in that first year continued to figure out how to navigate our marriage in a successful way it was just staying focused on God, staying focused on our love, and knowing that a healthy marriage is not made overnight.
Pre- and post-marriage counseling is key to strengthening communication
Meagan: We live in a climate where a lot of marriages don’t last very long. We wanted to give ourselves every single opportunity to be preventative. Not to walk into a situation like we need help now, but before we get to that place let’s talk through everything, let’s work out everything. With him and I both, we have things from childhood and past relationships and from a lot of different things that needed to be talked about and worked through. How are we going to raise our children? What is the kind of lifestyle that we want? What do we want out of our lives? Definitely, it was something that was invaluable, and it’s something we’d still do now. I would encourage anybody thinking about getting married or already married, it’s such a blessing.
The joy of a relationship has little to do with sex:
Meagan: It’s interesting because in a relationship there is so much joy, and I don’t think that the joy is wrapped up in the sex, I think sex or making love is icing on the cake, but I think that there’s a time for that. And for us while we were dating I had more joy in us dating then I had in any relationship that I’d been in. Because that joy was dependent upon us and our connection and the fun that we had together and getting to know each other and being excited about the possibility and it really was two best friends that are physically attracted to each other and falling in love with each other really enjoying life and so I would say that I don’t think that would take any joy out of the equation.
Practicing "The Wait" not only benefits your relationship but your career as well:
DeVon: When you can be disciplined in this area of your life it lays the foundation of success that your entire life will then rest upon because history is littered with great men who for whatever reason because this area is very difficult to get control of, this area of their life has lead to nations falling and so many things have happened because men have not taken on the charge of taking control of their sexuality and finding out how to manage it and tame it. I promise you once you start to manage this area of your life and to put it in perspective and having authority over it and it not having authority over you, you’re going to see your life go to another level. And you’re going to see the things that you’ve been wanting begin to manifest and then once you achieve them you actually will have the discipline and the respect and the poise to manage the success that you will have.
I can tell you so much of the success that many people see in Produced By Faith (DeVon’s first book) and the movies that I’ve been associated with, producing my own film, running my own company, and having an amazing wife and life, so much of it has come from the decision to live life in a way that I believe God wanted me to live, and to offer up my body as a living sacrifice every day with the desire of not only doing His will but to become everything that He wanted me to become and the result and the reward has far exceeded anything that I ever thought possible.
A great marriage isn't built overnight, it takes hard work:
DeVon: You have to give each other time to know one another. A great marriage is not built overnight. And a great marriage is built upon a foundation of peace and trust and freedom to get to know one another, so we’ve had to continue to learn to be committed to know each other as husband and wife and give each other enough room to grow and the freedom to express ourselves and also making sure that in the environment of our marriage, there’s also an acceptance of that expression, which is very important.
And her and I want to make sure that we both feel comfortable being who we are and sometimes saying what we need to say in order to grow into not only our best selves, but to be the best husband and wife to each other.
Get your copy of “The Wait” available in stores and at thewaitbook.org in stores now.
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Anyway, I personally think that the less shallow folks out here may contemplate calling things “quits” or they at least distance themselves a bit from their partner (and what I’m referring to is serious relationships) due to all of the stress and strain that oftentimes comes with the holidays whether it be financial, familial, due to their tight schedules or something else.
Listen, I would hate for you and your man to miss the fun and happiness of experiencing this time of year, all because you are so overwhelmed or irritated that you can’t really enjoy it. That’s why I have a few practical tips for how to avoid allowing the typical holiday season stress from INFECTING your relationship.
Manage Your Expectations
GiphyUnmanaged expectations. If there is a main reason why the holiday season tends to be so stress-filled for so many people, I’d bet good money that this is the cause. And when you’re in a long-term relationship, expectations can manifest themselves in all sorts of cryptic and/or unexpected ways. You might have relatives who assume that you are going to be with them for Thanksgiving or Christmas when you have other plans in mind. You might be thinking that you are going to spend one amount for presents while your man is thinking something totally different. When it comes to scheduling, your signals may be crossed.
And you know what? To all of these scenarios, this is where clear and consistent communication come in. Don’t assume anything. Don’t dictate anything either. From now until New Year’s, mutually decide to check in once a week, just to make sure that you are both on the same page as it relates to the holidays and what you both are thinking will come along with it. The less blindsided you both feel, the less stressed out you will be. Trust me on this.
Set (and Keep) a Budget
GiphyOkay, so I read that last year, 36 percent of Americans incurred some type of holiday-related debt. Hmph. Last year, there was still some sense of normalcy in this country, chile, so I can only imagine what finances are gonna look like over the next several weeks. That said, since I don’t know a lot of people who don’t find being broke stressful, make sure that you and your bae set a budget and then stick to it this year — no ifs, ands or buts.
Because really, y’all — it doesn’t make sense to deplete savings and/or max out credit cards for a few days of giggles only to be damn near losing your mind because you don’t know how to make ends meet come Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
And by the way, this tip doesn’t just speak to things like food and gifts; I also mean travel. If it doesn’t make a ton of sense (or cents) to be all over the place this year — DON’T BE.
Keep Matthew 5:37 at the Forefront
GiphyIf off the top of your head, you don’t know what Matthew 5:37 says, no worries, here ya go: “But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.” That verse right there? Oh, it’s a boundaries lifesaver! I say that because do you see “maybe” or “I’ll think about it” in there? Nope. LOL. It says that you should tell people “yes” or “no” and leave it at that — and that complements Anne Lamott’s quote, “’No’ is a complete sentence” impeccably well. Yeah, you’ve got to remember that anything beyond a yes or no to a request is privileged information; you don’t owe anyone details or an explanation.
Besides, if you are really honest with yourself, when someone asks you something and you give a “Umm, let me think about it” kind of reply, more times than not, you already know what your answer is going to be — so why not let you both off of the hook? Give your response. Commit to that. And let everyone (including yourself) get on with their lives and schedules.
I promise you that when it comes to those holiday parties, you are pissing more folks off by not RSVP’ing or doing so and not showing up than just saying, “Thank you but not this year” off the rip.
Remember That Your Personal Space Is Privilege Not a Right
GiphyA friend of mine recently bought a new house and invited me over to come see it. He’s a single man with no children, so as I was taking in all of the space that he had, especially as I walked through his finished basement, I joked about relatives coming to live with him. “Hell no” and “absolutely not” were pretty much his immediate responses as he went on to say that some folks even had the nerve to be offended when he told them that he had no intentions on taking DNA in.
Ain’t it wild how people think that your stuff is their right? And yes, that brings me to my next point. Your home is your sanctuary space. If you want to host folks this year — cool. If not, ALSO COOL. Please don’t let folks (family included) guilt you into how they want you to act or even into what they would do if the shoe was on the other foot. You are not them — and as one of my favorite quotes states, “If two people were exactly alike, one of them would be unnecessary.” (A man by the name Larry Dixon said that.)
Hell, my friends? They know that I am good for sending them random things that they need or even want all throughout the year. Coming over to hang out at my pace, though. Uh-uh. Chalk it up to being a card-carrying member of the ambivert club yet I like keeping my living space personal — and I sleep like a baby, each and every night, for feeling that way.
Always remember that your space, your time, your resources, your energy and shoot, yourself period (including your relationship), are all things that are your own. You get to choose how, when and why you want to share them. The holiday season is certainly no exception.
Cultivate Some “You Two Only” Traditions
GiphyIt’s not uncommon for some couples to hit me up after the holiday season to “detox.” Sometimes it’s due to the financial drama (and sometimes trauma) that they experienced. Sometimes it’s because they allowed their relatives (especially in-laws) to get more into their personal business than they should’ve. More than anything, though, it tends to be because they didn’t get enough quality time together and so ended up feeling “disconnected.”
Please don’t let that happen. Listen, I’m not even a holidays kind of woman and yet, I will absolutely sit myself down with some hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookies to enjoy a Hallmark holiday film or two. Aside from the fact that most of them are lighthearted and sweet, I also like that they usually focus on couples loving on each other amidst all of the holiday beauty and ambiance — which is something that all couples should set aside some time to do.
Maybe it’s a vacation. Maybe it’s a staycation. Or maybe it’s my personal favorite, A SEXCATION. Whether it’s for a few days, the weekend or even overnight — don’t you let the holidays go by without setting aside time for you and your man to celebrate one another. Don’t you dare (check out “Are You Ready To Have Some Very Merry 'Christmas Sex'?”).
GET. SOME. REST.
GiphyI once read that 8 out of 10 people get stressed out over the holidays and 3 out of 10 lose sleep during to it — and when you’re stress-filled and sleep-deprived, that can absolutely lead to hypersensitivity, making mountains out of molehills and even not being in the mood for sex.
Your relationship can’t afford to go through any of this, so definitely make sure to prioritize rest. I don’t care how unrealistic it might seem during this time, sleep should never be seen as a luxury; it will always and forever be a great necessity.
That said, try to get no less than six hours of shut-eye in (check out “6 Fascinating Ways Sex And Sleep Definitely Go Hand In Hand”) and even ask your bae to take a nap with you sometimes (check out “Wanna Have Some Next-Level Sex? Take A Nap, Sis.”). Not only will sleep help to restore your mind, body and spirit but, when it’s with your partner, it’s an act of intimacy that can make you both feel super connected, even in the midst of what might feel like chaos.
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Holiday season stress is real. Still, never give it the permission or power to throw your relationship off. Put you and your man first and let the holidays be what they are gonna be, chile.
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Using the same material from the interior of the Volvo EX90, Hudson crafted a wool-blend car coat and waistbelt that combine the vehicle’s Scandinavian design with his signature tailoring and intention. The exclusive collection launched on October 20, and each piece is made-to-order by Sergio Hudson Collections.
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In October, I traveled to Charleston with a group of journalists to get a firsthand look at Hudson and Volvo’s location. During a fitting, Hudson said his goal is to make “great work that can stand the test of time.”
“People can look back on and say, ‘I remember when Sergio did that collaboration with Volvo,’” he continued. “Thinking about aligning yourself with classic brands that speak to where you want to go. And I think that's what this collaboration kind of means to me and my business.”
Hudson pinpoints his mom as the biggest influence for his designs. This collaboration was no different.
“This particular coat reminded me of the swing coats that my mom used to wear in the early 90s. You know, diva girls in the early 90s had Sandra suits,” he said, referring to Jackée Harry’s character in 227. “My mom wore those and she would have these matching swing coats to go over them. And that's where the initial idea came. This would be around the same time that we had our Volvo. So she would put on her suit, her swing coat, get in that red Volvo, and go to church.”
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With this capsule and beyond, Hudson wants to see more staples rotating in and out of closets this fall. He advises fashionistas to build her closet out with essentials to mix and match that aren’t just stylish but also sustainable.
“It's just those special pieces,” he said. “You can wear the same shirt and pants every day and nobody will notice. But if you have a special boot, a special coat, a special bill, a special bag, that kind of speaks to everything that your style stands about, that is something you should focus on.”
These are the same kind of staple pieces that return to our Pinterest boards and TikTok feeds season after season. Fast fashion has never been Hudson’s aim. “I'm trying to create a special pieces that can stand the test of time,” he said in his warm, Southern accent. “I'm only creating those kind of pieces from here on out.”
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For Hudson, this collaboration is revolutionary. It’s his first time working with a car company and experimenting outside of his wheelhouse in this way.
“This is a Scandinavian brand, and, you know, it's 70 years old. I'm an African-American boy from South Carolina that has had a brand for 10 years. So I think bridging those two worlds and seeing the similarities was the beauty of this project,” he explained.
Though Hudson and his partner and CEO of Sergio Hudson Collections Inga Beckham have made massive strides in just 10 years, Hudson said the industry is far from where he wants to see it when it comes to Black representation. He pointed to how few Black designers were at this year’s Met Gala despite the theme being Black dandyism.
“The fact that I dressed 18 people speaks to how many of us weren't there,” he said. He implored more of industries, fashion and beyond, to collaborate with Black designers often.
“Allow mentorship. Allow funding. Allow great design to shine through,” he implored. “When it comes to being a designer of African descent, when you can't get the funding that your counterparts have, you can't compete. When you get opportunities like doing a collaboration with Volvo, or you get opportunities to be at the Met Gala, that's putting us on the equal playing field, but really the funding behind it is what we need to take it to that desk level.”
Featured image courtesy